Buccaneers' season: finished 3-13. This was Raheem
Morris' first season as head coach.

Saints' season: finished 13-3, clinched the #1 seed in the
NFC, and won Super Bowl XLIV.

What happened: through the first 13 games of the 2009
season, the Saints cut a pretty impressive swath through their
opponents, averaging a dominating 35.8 points scored per
game. Something happened for those last three games, and
the Saints offense fell off a cliff, scoring just 44
points total in those last three games.

The 2009 Buccaneers were a team with a mediocre defense and a
really bad offense. Bad enough that the Saints came within a
doinked field goal of winning the game in spite of their offensive
struggles. But after scoring on their first three drives, the
Saints offense dried up, and (thanks in part to a special teams
touchdown), the Buccaneers were able to start moving the ball on the
Saints defense right about that same time.

Also of note: one of the ironies of the bounty scandal
associated with this era of the Saints is that they had
a very unremarkable defense, at least in terms of points
allowed to their opponents. 19 teams in the league allowed fewer
points than the Saints during the 2009 regular season.